Night Watch
by Pilgrim Soul
Summary: A new recruit to Atlantis finds himself on the night watch. Oneshot, character study. Shepcentric. Spoilers for Season 3.


_**Disclaimer:** I do not own the rights to Stargate Atlantis or any of it's characters etc _

_**Betas: **Alipeeps as always and thanks to Linzi and Kodiak for their help._

_**A/N:** Firstly let me just say if any of you are waiting for an update on The Sacrifice of Innocence you have my sincerest apologies, I have made a start on part 3 but I've had a lot of personal issues that have made writing difficult for me lately._  
_This little one shot is an attempt to break my writers block and was written quite quickly and in a different style for me so I hope you like it_.

**Warning: **_This fic containers spoilers for the season 3 episode Common Ground_

**Night Watch by Pilgrim Soul**

I'm feeling real homesick right now. I've been thinking maybe I'm not cut out for all this, being so far from home. I couldn't tell my folks where I was going for obvious reasons; they think I'm in Iraq on some special UN assignment. I can write to them but I won't get any letters from them until the Daedalus comes back from Earth again in a just over a month. My little sister, she's got her senior prom in a couple of weeks. I wish I could be there to give her date hell. Can you imagine turning up to your date's house on prom night only to find out her big brother's a God damned marine?

I've only been here a week - one very surreal week. Five months ago I'd never even heard of the Stargate and now I'm here in another galaxy looking up at an alien moon and a sky filled with unfamiliar stars. I wonder if I can see our own sun from here. I'd ask one of the scientists but I don't want to be laughed at, it's tough enough being the newbie as it is.

I don't care what anyone says, this place is eerie at night. I think Major Lorne knows it creeps me out, that's why he gave me watch out on the west pier on my own. I knew Sergeant Gibson was only a few hundred yards away if I needed him but standing out there in the middle of the night, listening to the sea crashing against the walls below, it feels like you're alone in the universe and it's all too easy to imagine monsters crawling their way out of the black water. My mind conjured up an endless parade of horrors out there in that endless ocean and I found myself gripping my P-90 a little tighter.

And just as my brain was inventing a man-eating shark/squid hybrid, that's when I saw the movement. It was further down the pier, where a warehouse cast a deep shadow, blocking out the light from the living parts of the city. Perhaps it's just shadows, I thought, just my mind playing tricks, but the more I looked the more uncertain I became. I tried to convince myself that I had imagined it. But no, I saw it again; something moving down by the dock. By this time I was gripping my weapon so tightly my knuckles had turned white. I crept a little further down the pier whilst trying to decide if I should call Gibson? My first thought was no; if it was nothing, if it was just something blowing in the wind and I freaked out over I, I'd never live it down. But by this time I'm certain there's something there, crouched in the shadows; I can see it clearly. I whisper a "damn it!" under my breath. At least, I said something like that - it may not have been quite so polite. I figured it was better to make an ass of myself than risk a security breach just because I didn't want to look bad in front of the guys. My hand reached for my radio but it stopped dead when the dark shape in the shadows spoke.

"Lieutenant, if I really were an intruder I'd have slit your throat ten minutes ago." This time what I said under my breath definitely wasn't so polite. I mean, c'mon, of all the people it could have been.

"Colonel, I…um…I was…" I could see him clearly now; he was sitting on the dock with his legs dangling over the edge.

"Relax, Lieutenant. Last week I sat out here for two hours and Lucas didn't notice at all."

"Really?" Why was he sitting out there for two hours? Was this some kind of weird test he puts everyone through?

"Why do you think he's been on laundry duty all week?" He finally turned his head toward me and I could see his pale skin reflected in the moonlight. Despite the smile on his face, he looked drawn and tired.

"Sir?"

"Yeah."

"If you don't mind me asking, what are you doing out here?"

"Hmm?" He furrowed his brow, his mind obviously elsewhere. "Oh. Don't worry, I'm not checking up on you. Just couldn't sleep. It's Ryan, isn't it?"

"Yes, Sir. Lieutenant Andrew Ryan, Sir." The smirk grew a bit wider on his face and I winced at the sound of my own voice. Too keen, too formal? I've seen how the some of the other officers are around him, guys like Lorne and Edison; always joking and fooling around but they respect him. Boy, do they respect him.

"What do you like to be called? Ryan? Andy?"

"Um…Drew, Sir."

"Right." He nodded; his eyes were black in the moonlight and I could feel him studying me. "So what do you think of my city, Drew?" His city? That's what he called it. I looked up at the tall, intimidating spires that loomed over us.

"It's really quite something, Sir." And it is. The first time I saw Atlantis, it took my breath away. I mean, this place is a spaceship, for God's sake! It can fly! Or at least it could if it had the power, that's what Doctor Zelenka says anyway. He seems like a pretty cool guy; if I were going to invent a mad scientist, he'd probably look like Doctor Z. Colonel Sheppard's smile grew wider still and he looked up at the city with pride.

"Yes, she is.." She? He said she as though the city were alive; the thought sends a shiver down my spine even now. Like I said, alien city equals creepy in my book. "How are you settling in?"

"Um…good, fine." I must have sounded real convincing. Not.

"You don't like it here?" He seemed kind of surprised. "Anyone giving you a hard time?"

"No, Sir. It's just taking some getting used to. I mean, all this isn't exactly…normal." He just kind of stared at me for a moment.

"No. No, I guess not." He looked back out to sea again. "I kinda forget that." He turned back and must have seen the uncertainty in my face. "You'll be okay. I know it's a little scary at first." He pulled his legs up from where they were dangling over the edge and turned to fully face me, leaning his back against a post, his arms resting on his knees. "You know, when I came out here it was the first time I'd ever been through the gate. I often wonder, had I known what I was letting myself in for, whether I'd have told Elizabeth where to go."

"Do you ever wish you had?"

"No." He didn't need to think about that one. "No, never." There was real conviction in his voice too. So I stood there, feeling kinda awkward; did I just leave him to it? But before I could ask, he threw a question at me.

"Spend much time off-world when you were back at the SGC?"

"Yes, Sir. I was stationed at the Beta site for two months and I joined SG-14 for a couple of missions; even saw a Prior once." When I say I saw a Prior once, it was kind of from a distance and you know, it just looked like an old dude in a robe, he didn't do any magic or anything. "Never came across any life sucking aliens though." It was supposed to a light-hearted comment; it fell kinda flat.

"No. Life sucking seems to be a Pegasus Galaxy speciality." His voice was suddenly quiet and kinda distant-sounding, his hand moving to his chest just at the base of his throat. That's where they feed from - the Wraith. They have this weird mouth thing on palm of their hand and they slam it into your chest and suck the life right out of you. And that's what happened to the Colonel. No wonder the poor guy can't sleep. Hell, if half that stuff I heard about him is true it's a wonder the guy isn't in the nuthouse. Though according to a couple of the guys, he should be. He's not your average CO, that's for sure. I never had a senior officer turn up to a briefing on a skateboard before.

He just sat there, his hand resting against his skin and his head tipped back. He stared up in to the sky.

"How old are you?" he asked me, his voice still kind of detached.

"Twenty-four, Sir"

"Twenty-four. Younger than Aiden." I didn't ask who Aiden was; it seemed like he wasn't really talking to me anyway. "Why'd you want to come to Atlantis, Drew?"

"Um…well, I guess I thought it would be a…" I tried to think of the smart thing to say, you know the stuff you're supposed to say, about how you think it's an important mission for all humanity…that kind of crap, but he wasn't looking at the sky anymore, he was looking right at me; one look at his face and I knew he'd never buy it. "I thought it'd be…an adventure."

"It is." He paused for a second, looking back up into that big alien sky. "Biggest damn adventure you're ever going to have. You'll get to do extraordinary things, go to amazing places, meet incredible people and if you're lucky some of them might actually not be trying to kill you."

If he was going for comforting, he missed the mark. I mean, I'm not scared of action; I'm a marine, I've seen action. But the Wraith? They're aliens, for God's sake, real live aliens. Some of them are even green. So maybe I'm not cut out for this, maybe the stark realisation of it all is a lot scarier than I thought it would be. I think he knows, I think he could see it in me, my fear, but if he did, he really sucks at the whole pep talk thing.

"You've been here a whole week and so far your CO is still alive and you've not woken up a race of life sucking aliens hell bent on making Earth it's next feeding ground. That's already better than I managed." His tone was light but there was a darker edge that made it clear that what he said wasn't really funny; it's anything but funny.

There's a lot of stories about that first year here and what happened, how the then Major Sheppard was responsible for the almighty FUBAR mission that got his CO killed and pissed off the Wraith. But you don't repeat those stories in front of any of the original "Atlanteans"; one of my fellow newbies found that out the hard way. I hear the locker room floor has never looked so clean.

He got to his feet, stretching out his back and sighing heavily, and just kind of stood there looking at me, like he could see what I'm thinking, and I figured, what the hell, go ahead and ask him. So I did.

"Sir? Why'd you pick me?" I guess curiosity got the better of me; out of all the officers who'd applied for Atlantis, he'd picked me and I wanted to know why. I figured I'd never get a better chance to ask him. It took a while for him to answer. I was beginning to think he wasn't going to say anything but eventually he did.

"Because you were the right man for the job."

"Why? There were guys more experienced than me, smarter than me…"

"I read your file, talked to your former CO. What you did in Iraq, going back for those men like that…that was the deciding factor." I should have left it at that, I should have just said "thank you, Sir" and walked away but I was tired and homesick. I'd got the posting because of what happened in Iraq. I'd figured as much. After all it's what got me into the Stargate project and got me a shiny new medal to hang on my chest - now it had got me all the way to another galaxy. Everybody's always made out like it's a big deal and I just feel like a fraud.

"Sir, I…don't go thinking I'm some kind of hero - I'm not like you. I wasn't being brave or heroic, I didn't even think about what I was doing. They gave me a God damned medal and everyone kept telling me how brave I was but I just did it because there wasn't a choice; they were my buddies and I couldn't have lived with myself if I'd left them behind." He looked away from me out to sea and I thought I'd said too much; I half expected to be packing my things to head back to Earth with the Daedalus by now.

"I know." He answered so quietly I could barely hear him. "You don't leave people behind."

He stood there for a while, just staring out across the blackness of the ocean, the wind blowing at him. He must have been cold standing out there; the wind was really getting up and spray from the ocean was being whipped up so I could feel it against my skin and he was standing out on the dock. He must have been getting soaked but he didn't seem to notice.

Minutes went past and I'd pretty much made up my mind to leave him to it; I figured a week of laundry duty would be in my near future anyway. But before I could turn away he moved suddenly and walked right up to me. Now I'm a big guy, stocky, and he looks kind of skinny next to me but he's a few inches taller than me and he got so close I had to look up at him and for the first time I could really see his eyes. At the risk of sounding weird, there's something damn scary about those eyes; there's too much going on behind them, they look right into you.

"Drew, I may be a lot of things but I'm not a hero…I'm just making it up as I go along, I think when you really get down to it most people are, but I do know you're the right man for the job. You're just going to have to trust me on that."

"Yes, Sir." His mouth quirked up on one side into something like a smile.

"Good." He looked at me for a second before turning away, looking kind of embarrassed. "Well, it's been good talking to you, Drew." He glanced down at his watch. "Oh crap! I should go get some sleep, I've got a briefing at 07:00." And he just turned and jogged down the pier, leaving me alone again. I glanced at my own watch - it was 03:19. He sure as hell wasn't going to get much sleep.

I can't help feeling that something more went on in our conversation than was actually said, only I can't work out what it was. John Sheppard is pretty infamous back at the SGC; there's so many stories about him, good and bad, half of them I didn't believe but then I met him and all of a sudden they didn't seem so far fetched. I'm still homesick and I'm still scared but he thinks I'm the right man for the job so I guess I'll be sticking around.


End file.
